Love
The Coy One
Translated by Edgar Alfred Bowring (1853) · From Songs
ONE Spring-morning bright and fair,
Roam'd a shepherdess and sang;
Young and beauteous, free from care,
Through the fields her clear notes rang:
So, Ia, Ia! le ralla, &c.
Of his lambs some two or three
Thyrsis offer'd for a kiss;
First she eyed him roguishly,
Then for answer sang but this:
So, Ia, Ia! le ralla, &c.
Ribbons did the next one offer,
And the third, his heart so true
But, as with the lambs, the scoffer
Laugh'd at heart and ribbons too,--
Still 'twas Ia! le ralla, &c.
Cite this poem
MLA
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. “The Coy One.” Translated by Edgar Alfred Bowring. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/goethe/7/.
Chicago
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. “The Coy One.” Translated by Edgar Alfred Bowring. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/goethe/7/.
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